Tuesday 12/8

Tuesday 12-8 6am

Blizzard watch in NW part of the state; rain for us all day with high winds -- 35 gusting to 50. So much for going anywhere today. Not particularly cold, though, which is good. Tomorrow I'm going to try the library for wifi and get my newsletter out! Maybe trundle around town a little and have a look. There's a billiards parlor downtown; maybe I'll try it out (without pulling out my own cue until I get some practice in).

Met Caleb yesterday. Nice guy, very soft-spoken, called me ma'am a lot. Told him that it didn't bother me but between co-workers was a little formal. He stopped doing it by the end of the day. When I first came in and introduced myself, he said "nice to meet you" and nothing else. Great, I thought, another non-talker. But by the end of the day my scintillating personality (hah) had thawed him considerably and I've begun to get his life story (when he was 15 his father required him to stop saying mom and dad and begin saying ma'am and sir -- weird, huh?).

Had a pretty good day sales-wise. One time was dealing with a group of four elderly Chinese women, all of whom were interested in geodes. Much heaving about of some hefty rocks, no I like this blue one better than that blue one, wait let's see that purple one, but what about this red one, and on and on. But they were fun. I believe they're not going to use them as bookmarks but in their small gardens, a venerable Asian tradition to have interesting rocks in gardens.

Schedule for week is off Tue-Wed, work half-day Thur, off Fri-Sun, work all day Mon-Tue. I believe I can handle this. What a nice change from Akela.

It's 6.30am now and the sky is beginning to lighten. I see big clouds scudding across the sky, driven by the wind. No color yet but it's going to be interesting soon. I'll see if I can get a picture through the window (not going out, thank you very much).

Ta.

Update at 5.30pm.
Well! The winds did a job all over the area. El Paso officially had 68mph. The White Sands base police building lost its entire roof, with shattered windows. A canopy at a stadium, which was supposed to withstand higher winds, blew off. The system has now moved into the middle of the country as a blizzard.

White Sands is only about 30 miles south of here but it got the full effect of the wind funneling through the pass. I bounced around some in the rig but never felt like it was going to go airborne. Tomorrow is to be breezy (15mph), low 50s, sunny, so I'm going to town, as planned.

Oh yeah. Saw Clint Eastwood on "Ellen" today. He's about to turn 80!